This invention relates to a self-erecting display device of paperboard or the like that is collapsible to a flat condition and adapted to be expanded to an erected condition by elastic means such as a rubber band, and more particulalry to a display panel for use on such a display device.
Collapsible self-erecting hollow display devices have heretofore been used, for example, as novelty or advertising devices. One such device of this nature that has been made and sold by applicant comprises a self-erecting structure with two endwalls--a topwall and a bottomwall--connected together by pairs of sidewalls that are hingedly connected together at one edge and hingedly connected at their opposite ends to the edges of the endwalls. Elastic means such as a rubber band is disposed inside the display device and is connected at each end to one of the pairs of sidewalls on opposite sides of the display device--the connection being made adjacent to the interconnecting fold between the two sidewalls of each of the pairs of sidewalls. Such devices have been used, for example, as a calender with hexagonal endwalls on which the advertiser's name or message appears and with six sidewalls secured to each of the endwalls. to provide a total of twelve sidewalls on which the months of the year are displayed.
Similar self-erecting devices have also been provided with upstanding display panels on one of the endwalls--such as the topwall. In the Drueck U.S. Pat. No. 4,619,426, for example, there is shown a collapsible self-erecting device having an upstanding advertising panel in which the panel includes a tab extending downwardly from the bottom edge thereof through a slot in the topwall of the device. The tab is formed with a hook to which one end of the rubber band is attached so that, when the display is in the erected condition, tension in the rubber band not only pulls the endwalls together to hold the device in the erected condition, but also causes the display panel to stand up on the topwall. A display panel of this nature is limited in that it requries attachment to the rubber band, which in turn requires that it be on the wall of the device to which the rubber band is normally connected or that there be two rubber bands--one for moving the device to its erected condition and one for holding the panel in a stand-up condition--which adds to the manufacture and assembly of the device.
Another self-erecting display device with a stand-up portion is shown, for example, in the Ditzler et al U.S. Pat. No. 2,601,374. In this case, the stand-up portion is an integral part of the display and again requires connecting the stand-up panel to the elastic element.
Stand-up display panels for cartons or containers are also known, for example, from the Rittenhouse U.S. Pat. No. 1,689,155 and the Robbins U.S. Pat. No. 1,448,767. These devices, however, are not collapsible self-erecting devices and they are mounted separately on the carton or container.
It is an object of this invention to provide a stand-up panel for a collapsible self-erecting display device in which the panel can be readily added to the display device and will function along with the display device as it is moved between the collapsed and erected conditions.